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IN MEMORIAM. 



ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 



• 1 



NEW LONDOjN^ CONNECTICUT, 

IN HONOR OF 

ABRAHAM LINCOLN, 

Sixteenth President of the United States, 
Wednesday, April 19, 1865, 



INCLUDING TBK PUBLIC ADDRBSSBS OP 



REV. G. B. WILL COX, 



REV. THOMAS P. FIELD, D. D 



NEW LONDON: 
C. PRINCE, No. 4 MAIN STREET, 

STARR i FARNHAM, PKINTEKS. 
18G5. 



)fCO^"i t. 



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.Cy7Y0F>N^!! 



ABRAHAM LINCOLN, 

Born Feb. 12, 1809, 

ELECTED PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES, Nov. 0, 1860, 

EE-ELECTED PRESIDENT, Nov. 8, 1864, 

ASSASSINATED APRIL 14, 1865. 



PROCLAMATION BY THE MAYOR. 



The Nation amidst rejoicings for tlie great and signal victories of ita armies, 
has been called to mourn the death of its Chief Magistrate— Abraham Lin- 
coln, a great and good man, a wise and merciful President, has fallen by the 
hands of a Traitor and assassin. The Nation weeps with a bitter and heart- 
felt sorrow. 

"Wednesday, April 19th, having been appointed for the funeral of the late 
President, Abraham Lincoln, in accordance with the vote of Court of Com- 
mon Council, of this city, I do direct that the City Flag with drapery of 
mourning, be displayed at half mast during said day ; that the church bells be 
tolled from 11 to 12 o'clock (noon); and our citizens are requested to close 
their places of business upon the tolling of the bells, and assemble at their 
respective places of worship in accordance with the recommendation of the 
Secretary of State at Washington. 

The members of the Court of Common Council and other city oiScers and 
oCQcers of the Government of the United States, are requested to unite in a 
procession at 2 o'clock P. M., and to appear with suitable badges of mourning. 

HIRAM WILLEY, Mayor. 

Dated at the city of New London, April ISth, 18G5. 



THE DAY OF MOURNING. 



The 19tb day of April, 1865, will long be remembered by 
the citizens of New London, as the day of mourning. At an 
early hour, the half hour guns commenced firing from Fort 
Trumbull, and the revenue cutter James Campbell. Thou- 
sands of flags were raised at half mast or otherwise displayed, 
draped with the symbols of mourning. Before noon all tlie 
public buildings, nearly every store, and two thirds of the 
private residences were trimmed with black. All the mourn- 
ing goods in the stores were disposed of, and thousands of 
black garments were tastefully arranged in windows. 

At eleven o'clock the bells commenced tolling. Appropriate 
religious services were held in the Episcopal churcli at noon. 
At the same hour there was a united service of various de- 
nominations in the 2d Congregational church. The psalm 
commencing with " Lord, thou hast been our dwelling place 
through all generations," was chanted by the choir. Rev. Mr. 
Wightman read a portion of the 15th chapter of 1st Corinthi- 
ans. Prayer was offered up by Rev. Mr, LawTcnce. The 
choir sung the hymn *• How blest the righteous when he dies." 
An address was delivered by Rev. Mr. Willcox, after which 
the hymn commencing " Servant of God, well done," was sung 
by the choir, and the Benediction was pronounced by Rev. 
Mr. Wightman. The procession was formed on State street, 
with the right resting at the Court House, and moved at two 
o'clock, under the direction of the following ofhcers, who were 
selected Tuesday evening : 

Col. F. B. LOOMIS, Chief Marshal. 
Assistant Marshals. 
Dr. W. W. Sheffield, F. W. Fitch, Col. II. R, Bond, 

Capt, W. H. Bentley, John L. Bacon, F. L. Allen. 



ORDER OF PROCESSION. 

First Division. 

Chief Marshal and Aids. 

Police Force. 

Third Artillery Band, U. S. A. 

Detachment of United States Troops. 

Masons. 

Good Templars. 

Fenian Brotherhood. 

Committee of Arrangements. 

Selectmen, Mayor, Aldermen, and Common Councilmen. 

The Rev. Clergy. 

Officers of Army, Navy, and Revenue. 

Civil Officers of U. S. Government. 

Bartlctt Cadets. 



Pall Bearers. 



Pall Bearers. 



Funeral Car 

drawn by 

Six AVhite Horses. 



Pall Bearers. 



Pall Bearers. 



Second Division. 

Assistant Marshal and Aids. 

14th Infantry Band, U. S. A. 

Detachment from Revenue Service. 

Fire Companies in the order of their numbers. 

Employees of Railroads and Manufactories. 

Citizens and Strangers on foot. 

Cavalcade of Horsemen. 

Citizens in Carriages. 



Committee of Arrangements. 

F. B. Loomis, Henry Potter, F. L. Allen, 

Geo. T. Marshall, Alfred Coit, W. H. Bentley, 

Geo. Wilhams, Chas. Middleton, AVm. B, Lewis, 

Leonard Hempstead, R. F. Tate. 



The Procession countermarched through State street and then 
proceeded through the principal" streets of the city in the fol- 
lowing order, viz :— Bank, Truman, Coit, Huntington, Broad, 
William, Granite, Hempstead, Federal, Main, returning to State 

street. 

When the procession moved through State street the second 
time, it was composed as follows : Mounted marshals, policemen 
and constables, 3d U. S. Artillery Band, playing a dirge, Ma- 
sons on foot and in carriages, a detachment of Good Templars, 
bearing a beautiful U. S. flag draped in mourning, citizens 
bearing a splendid silk banner, decorated with portraits of 
Lincoln and Hamhn, which was presented by the Norwich 
Wide Awakes to the New I^ondon Wide Awakes, in 1860, 
clergymen, city ofl&cers in carriages, mounted marshals, band 
of 14th U. S. Infantry, a detachment from the navy, Niagara 
Engine Co. No. 1, Protector No. 2, Eelief No. 3, Nameaug 
Engine Co., Eeliance No. 5, mounted citizens, funeral car with 
pall bearers, Bartlett Cadets with musicians. The engines were 
most tastefully decorated and drawn by horses. 

The funeral car was constructed as follows : A frame work six 
feet high and about fifteen feet long, trimmed with black and 
white cambric, having a rounding top, an urn on the top centre, 
and two shields on each side and one on the rear, was appropri- 
ately mounted and made a fine appearance. It was made by 
Messrs. Staynor & Hammond, and drawn by six white horses. 
Each horse had on a black velvet blanket trimmed with white 
lace. At about 4 P. M. the procession halted in front of the City 
Hall, and after introductory remarks by the Hon. Augustus 
Brandegee, prayer was offered by Kev. Dr. Grant, and an ad- 
dress was delivered by Kev. Br. Field. The services were 
closed with the Benediction by Eev. Dr. Hallam. 



ADDRESS BY EEV. G. B. WILLCOX. 



We assemble to-day not so much to listen to any 
words in the sanctuary, as to hear the occasion itself 
speaking in all the grand and mournful pathos of its 
silence. We have come to a funeral. The remains of 
him whom we have gathered to honor are just about to 
be borne forth robed for the sepulcher. And yet no bier 
stands here before us. No cold face asleep in death lies 
awaiting our sad farewells. Far away is the silent and 
majestic dead, whom we mourn with one consent to-day ; 
who though distant is enshrined in the hearts of us all. 

In hastily throwing together, during the few hours of 
preparation allowed me, some thoughts appropriate to 
the moment, I have been almost instinctively led to the 
scene of sacred story which rises at once to the view of 
any thoughtful mourner — the scene on the mount where 
Moses closed his long career. You find it recorded in 
the opening verses of the 34th chapter of Deuteronomy. 

" And Moses went up from the plains of Moab, unto 
the mountain of Nebo, to the top of Pisgah, that is over 



v> 



10 

against Jericho ; and the Lord showed him all the land 
of Gilead unto Dan, and all Naphtali, and the land of 
Ephraim and Manasseh, and all the land of Judah unto 
the utmost sea ; and the south and the plain of the val- 
ley of Jericho, the city of palm trees, unto Zoar. And 
the Lord said unto him, 'This is the land which I 
sware unto Abraham, and unto Isaac, and unto Jacob, 
saying, I will give it unto thy seed. I have caused 
thee to see it with thine eyes, but thou shalt not go 
over thither.' So Moses, the servant of the Lord, died 
there in the land of Moab, according to the word of the 
Lord." 

Here came the aged prophet to the close of his event- 
ful life. And at how many points of contact his history 
seems to blend in resemblance with that of our beloved 
^ and lamented Chief ! 

The Jewish leader had conducted his countrymen 
through a course of fortunes more amazing and mo- 
mentous than any people had experienced before. His 
life had covered events that stand out in history as mon- 
umental ; events that opened a new act in the drama of 
the ages. A nation which indeed had existed before, 
but existed only in the womb of Egyptian bondage, 
had been born into a freer and larger life. Sinai had 
emerged from the insignificance of a desolate crag of the 
desert, to stand forever as the type of Divine law, thun- 
dering its wrath against transgression. A new economy 
of God had been instituted, and the progress of the 
world set forward in the grandest epoch that had yet 



11 

arrived. All tliis within the single life and experience 
of this one man of God. And have our modern ages 
seen a more eventful career than his whose remains we 
weep over to-day ^ A nation that if faiily born before, 
was yet in the swaddling cloths of an old relic of bar- 
barism, is casting off its bonds for a growth to a nobler 
manhood. A purer type of Christianity than the world 
has known before, is here we hope henceforth to find 
not only " a name" but " a local habitation," Many a 
christian person had blessed the world with his beautiful 
life. A christian people, as we dare believe, is now to "^ 
be molded under the plastic hand of God. All this ac- j 
complished or begun within the closing years of the life 
we have mot to honor. 

But the Jewish prophet had attended his countrymen 
through a great moral transformation. Starting impeni- 
tent toward God, like Saul of Tarsus, on their journey, 
like him they had come to the end of it humbled and 
reverent. They had learned in those years of bitter 
suffering, the lessons needed as a fit preparation for en- 
tering on their inheritance. But what lessons have we 
too learned, as a people, under the leadership of our 
Moses ! We entered into the howling wilderness of 
confusion and war, a nation of oppressors. We oppress- 
ed the poor in the South with slavery. We oppressed 
them in the North with a heathenish prejudice of caste 
against a skin not colored like our own. God meant 
that we should not emerge from our desert till this 
iniquity had been well disposed of. The Jews had a 



12 

forty days' journey before them. The Lord turned it 
into a journey of forty years. We babbled about a three 
months war, and what have we seen instead ! Our hon- 
ored Secretary of State predicted a struggle of ninety 
days. And now, when four long years have hardly suf- 
ficed, and we, like the Jews, must leave our loved leader 
in his grave, as we enter the Canaan before us, the Sec- 
retary has found the war forcing its grun face and its 
murderous hand into his own quiet chamber. And this 
because we modern Jews were slow to learn God's lesson. 
But even into our dull, indocile souls, the Great Teacher 
has wrought the lesson at last. The Chief Magistrate 
with whom we started still wedded to our sin, has died 
on the summit of Pisgah, to leave us measurably cleans- 
ed of our shame and curse. 

Yes, died on the summit of Pisgah. And here have 
we another of these sad, touching parallels between 
these two most remarkable lives. The old prophet shar- 
ed the eagerness of his countrymen to enter the promised 
land. He, too, like them, was hoping to dwell in peace 
after his wanderings, under his own vine, in the land that 
flowed with milk and honey. But this could not be. 
The Lord leads Jiim up the steep shoulders of Mount 
Nebo, till he stands pinnacled on its hoary head, just 
under the trailing curtains of the clouds. And there in 
thoughtful silence he is suffered to look on the splendid 
panorama of Canaan, stretching in fertile beauty far 
away in the South to the desert, in the West to the blue 
rolling Mediterranean, and off to the stately mountains 



13 

of the North. But farther he must not go. Sadly but 
submissively he turns him away from the grand and gor- 
geous vision, seeking the place where the finger of the 
Lord has pointed him to lie down and die. 

Our honored President was spared the pain of disap- 
pointed hope. The leaden messenger of death eclipsed 
with a sudden unconsciousness his strong and buoyant 
spirit. But the fact remains as a sad theme for our 
thought, that, after his years of burdensome care and 
throbbing anxiety ; after having, under God, brought his 
countrymen just to the verge of the realization of his 
and their fondest hopes ; while he stood with eager eye 
and raised arm, pointing us forward to the glorious fu- 
ture, he fell bleedmg and dying, leaving us to pass by to 
the promised possession. O, it is well that we weep to- 
day ; for a more touching, mournful tragedy has hardly 
taken our planet for its theater, since the earth shudder- 
ed and the sun veiled his face at Calvary ! Thanks be to 
God that, if that true and noble heart was not spared to 
beat with ours in the joy of returning peace and a coun- 
try saved, he has passed before us to a better country, 
that is a heavenly ! 

The Nation has been invited to-day, 'by the appropri- 
ate officer, to attend this funeral. They would -have 
attended it without an invitation. They could not have 
found heart for either cares or diversion, while the solemn 
dirge w^as sounding of such beloved dead. 

A nation at a funeral ! It is even so ; and God from 
on high is looking down on the scene which Himself had 



14 

ordained for a great and worthy end. The dead march 
in the streets of the Capital is heard in every cottage 
across the land. It silences the loom and the hammer; 
it stills the rising shout over new victories just announc- 
ed ; and in the awful hush we wait while this endeared, 
revered sleeper is borne to the tomb. As if some vast 
cloud-shade, broad as the continent, had fallen upon us, 
the land is black to-day with the symbols of mourning. 
We are not a sentimental people. "We are not, like some 
foreign nations, quick to show with outward demonstra- 
tions all the changing phases of our feeling. But an 
occasion has come to us impressive enough to move even 
the habitual calm and reserve of New England life. We 
are responding on a grander scale, with a deeper sincerity 
perhaps, than has ever been known in history, to one 
absorbing sorrow. The story is told in Scottish tradi- 
tion of a laird who projected a gigantic Eolian harp. 
Stretching his chords from the summit of one neighbor- 
ing hill to another, he listened at evening while the low, 
faint wail of the winds playing through them subdued 
the whole region to sadness. A grander harp is swept, 
my friends, with sadder strains to-day. As the electric 
wires quiver with -the mournful announcement to the na- 
tion that the funeral pageant at Washington has taken 
its line of march, one broad deep murmur of lament for 
the dead, rising and falling with solemn cadence, is borne 
onward from mountain range to range across the bosom 
of the Continent ! 

For many reasons he whom we meet to honor was 



15 

dearer than public men are wont to be to the masses 
of his countrymen. He was a man of the people ; a", 
man, so to speak, of all the people. He represented all. 
There were elements entering into his make which an- 
swered to an immense range and variety of American 
character. He was, in many features, the truest type of 
the native bom republican that has ever yet risen among 
us to so high a position. He carried the flavor of the, 
soil in his qualities. You may see in any geological 
cabmet a fragment of rock in which different strata, such 
as reach away for leagues beneath the hills and valleys, 
happen to have met, and lie layer upon layer. It is the 
deep and wide-spread crust of the planet shown up in 
miniature. Such a miniature was Abraham Lincoln of ' 
American society. The different grades or tiers of our 
society were all represented in him. He had belonged 
to them all. Beginning his life among the humblest ofj 
the poor, he worked his way, as it is the glory of our 
institutions that only an American can work his way, to 
the loftiest position on this or any other continent. And 
on his way upward, he carried with him the respect 
and affection of the men of every grade of intelligence 
through which he passed. Every body knows that the 
plainest of the people delighted to do him honor. Every 
body knows that he could meet them cordially in their 
own homely way. But not quite every one is aware 
that he could bear himself, when occasion required, with 
the dignified courtesy of any gentleman of the Senate 
or the Cabinet. AYe have the testimony for this, if we 



16 

need it, of no less an authority than Edward Everett. 
The miserable scandal about the alleged boorishness of 
the President never estranged from him the respect of 
any man whose opinion was worth his notice. Had his 
manner been open to all the charges falsely brought 
against it, the goodness of his heart might have well 
been admitted to make all amends. A benignity like his 
would have lighted up the roughest exterior vrith a rare 
spiritual beauty. If you have learned that a certain 
stone is the Kohinoor diamond, you are little concern- 
ed whether or not the last polish has been given its sur- 
face ! 

There was much caviling at one period at the Presi- 
dent, because he moved on with his measures no faster 
in advance of the people. But who now will not ac- 
knowledge his wisdom in that "? He chose to be an index 
of public sentiment, without attempting to lead it. It is 
easy to force up the thermometer by holding it over a 
fire. But that will not change the weather, or hasten 
the spring by an hour. 

Mr. Lincoln preferred to be lifted from point to point, 
not by his own buoyant zeal, but by the rising swell of 
the national feeling, bearing him up on its own broad 
bosom. Take him first on the 4th of March, 1861, say- 
ing in his inaugural, " I understand a proposed amend- 
ment to the Constitution has passed Congress, to the 
effect that the Federal Government shall never interfere 
with the domestic institutions . of the States, including 
that of persons held to service. * * * * Holding 



17 

such, a provision now to be implied Constitutional law, 
I have no objection to its being made express and irrevo- 
cable." Think of that ! Offering to bmd this young 
nation to stagger forever under that hideous curse ! 
Ready to pledge that the slave should interminably 
wail in his black despair ! But look four years later, to 
find this same man urging on Congress a very different 
amendment to the Constitution ; an amendment to 
abolish American Slavery at once and forever ! Why 
now the amazing change to exactly the opposite point 
of the compass ? Is he fickle ? No man less so. But 
he has changed with the American people, being one of 
the people. Always hating slavery, but bound by sup- 
posed Constitutional trammels, he rejoices with the na- 
tion in finding the trammels cut by the sword of the 
rebellion. The tide on the Ganges comes in with a 
surging crest, that bears the boatman high on its foam- 
ing summit far inland along the channel. And the 
boatman's safety is in not forcing his little craft forward 
over the crest, lest, instead of hastening his progress, 
he be only overwhelmed in the seething waters. The 
President moved with the tide, since he could not move 
faster without rashness and peril. 

But the tenderness of his heart toward the poor and 
the bitterly wronged was no secret. The slaves were 
everywhere his admirers ; everywhere, by the quick in- 
stinct of misery seeking for sympathy, turned toward 
his name as a symbol of hope. In childish ignorance 
seeing in him a deliverer, they toucliingly blended the 



18 

name of " Massa Linkum" with that of the Redeemer 
of the world. No eulogy could carry a deeper meaning 
than that ! And now, as it was yesterday announced, 
the poorest negroes in Washington are trying to show 
their love for his memory by hanging their wretched 
homes in black. They wander about, picking up the 
little clippings of muslin and crape thrown aside by 
their wealthier neighbors ; and, sewing them into irregu- 
lar strings, put them up tearfully over their doorways 
and windows. O my friends, what is the honor of pa- 
geants and monuments compared with this ! It is the 
deep, pathetic voice of human nature herself, coming up 
from her inmost soul to announce her recognition of a 
thoroughly good man. These simple children of sor- 
row and want — the dead President will have no pane- 
gyric to-day in all this broad land, that will equal the 
dumb eloquence of their tears ! And those outbreaks 
of violence among the rough, common people of the 
great cities, just now, threatening every traitor who dares 
rail at the President's memory- — these are not mere 
explosions of lawlessness. They show the bitter grief 
of rude natures, inwardly sobbing with a vehemence 
too mtense to be trifled with. Call them, if you will, a 
poor fashion of honoring the dead. They are at least 
sincere. . And a sincere grief, however disfigured, is an 
honor to any man borne to his grave. 

The gentleness of the heart of Mr. Lincoln betrayed 
itself in the strangest of all places for such an exhibi- 
tion — in the public documents issued in his admmis. 



19 

tration. State papers, in general such stiiF models of 
frigid precision, became in his hands often warm appeals 
from a benignant soul. He travailed in spirit, he was 
ready to weep, over the madness of the South. Hear 
him in the first inaugural he addressed to the venemous 
traitoi-s who had even then plotted against his life. "In 
your hands my dissatisfied fellow countrymen, and not 
in mine, is the momentous issue of civil war. The Gov- 
ernment will not assail you. You can have no conflict 
without being yourselves the aggressors. You have no 
oath registered in heaven to destroy the Government, 
while I shall have the most solemn one to preserve, pro- 
tect and defend it. I am loth to close. We are not 
enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies. Though 
passion may have strained, it must not break our bonds 
of affection." If the rebel General Ewell, the other 
day, on his way to confinement as a prisoner of war, 
shed tears as is reported, when told of the President's 
death, exclaiming, " We have lost the best friend we 
had !" he never said a truer thing in his life. 

But every christian at least will turn gladly from these 
proofs of a mere amiable nature, to enjoy the evidences 
left by this noble man that his heart was right toward 
God. Religion has been so infamously travestied and 
burlesqued by the chief conspirator among the rebels, 
that one almost dreads to ascribe it to any man foremost 
in public life. To see this notorious ringleader of sedi- 
tion starving and freezing our loyal soldiers beneath his 
own eye on Belle Isle and in Libby Prison ; and mean- 



20 

while canting^ in Fast Day Proclamations about his faith 
in an overruling Providence — his religion is of all his 
meannesses the meanest. Contrasted with this mis- 
erable counterfeit, the honest, humble piety of Mr. Lin- 
coln shone with the finer luster. His last words to his 
townsmen at Springfield — how deep their simple-hearted 
reverence for God ! " I know not how soon I shall see 
you again. * * * * I feel that I cannot succeed 
without the same Divine aid which sustained Washing- 
ton ; and on the same Almighty Being I place my reli- 
ance for support ; and I hope you, my friends, will all 
pray that I may receive the Divine assistance, without 
which I cannot succeed, but with which success is cer- 
tain." This, too, was at the lowest point of his religious 
life, if not even before it had begun. From this point 
it rose like a rising sun, with its mild, strong light in- 
creasing to the close of his noble life. There are some 
men of so fine a quality that honors and distinctions 
that mflate the pride of others, are to them only a 
means of grace. The higher they rise in their station, 
the lower they sink in their humility. And of these 
men was he whom we mourn to-day. He was far more 
oppressed by the responsibilities, than elated by the hon- 
or, of his position. He felt life to be good for nothing 
but to work in for God's service and men's welfare. And 
the Presidency was better than law practice at Spring- 
field, only because it would help to a more eficctive work. 
No one can have watched the piety of Mr. Lincoln with- 
out feeling that it diftered from that of most other pub- 



21 

lie men There is a religion of State, the religion that 
figures in proclamations and inaugurals, with formal, de- 
corous recognition of God. But you will look in vain 
among the chief men of the nation for one who has so 
carried his devout temper, as did the President, into his 
closet. He loved to come straight to the matter of per- 
sonal experience of Christ. When a Methodist preach- 
er, turning the conversation from national matters, in- 
quired as to the state of his soul, he welcomed the ques- 
tion with tears. We have had many great men who 
were ready to acknowledge God as Grand Ruler of na- 
tions, — not many who were willing to say with this 
simple-hearted statesman, " I do love Jesus." God grant 
us such Presidents in long succession from age to age ! 

But now that he is gone, and gone by the cruel hand^ 
of a rebel assassin, we have other duties as well as those 
of bemoaning his loss. We have the duty of sternly 
vindicating this nation against traitors who have mur- 
derously struck at its life. Our President, in the excess 
of his kindness of heart, suifered these venomous crea- 
tures to breathe the air of his capital. And now the 
viper that was warmed in his bosom, has shown its true 
nature. It is only a sample of what will happen to the 
nation, if the nation pursues the same course! These, 
leading conspirators are the fangs of the serpent. In 
them is the venom. Extract the fangs and the body of 
the rebellion that remains will be easily tamed. Banish 
them, every man, with the penalty of death for returning ! 
and the storm that heaves the continent would sink to a 
summer's calm. 



22 

There are men who would debauch the moral sense of 
the nation by talking of this as unchristian resentment. 
What can they mean by such language 1 Have we not 
a Government 1 Are not governments ordained of God 
for the punishment of evil doers, no less than for the 
praise of those who do well 1 And when a Government 
proposes to discharge this high duty, can no motive bet- 
ter than revenge be ascribed to if? Is this wretched 
assassin, Booth, to be executed, if we find him, and must 
the arch conspirators whose hands are red with the blood 
' of half a million of murders, be left unmolested 1 We 
need the sentiment of justice toned up within us to some 
higher pitch than this. For if Government is nothing 
more than such morbid sentimentality concedes, it was 
never worth these years of sanguinary war. And mercy 
to the cancer is death to the patient. It will never be 
anything else than cancer while it remains in the body. 

They would have us conciliate the Southern leaders 
by kindness, drawing them out of their conspiracy by 
affection. So the magnetic mountain, in the Eastern 
story, drew the nails from the passing vessel, leaving the 
ship to fall assunder and sink ! And when the story 
comes true, not before, we too may succeed in this policy. 

Many truths long familiar, are struck with a sudden 
illumination, by the event we deplore. How inde- 
pendent is God showing himself to be of all instruments 
and agents ! W^e almost thought, some of us, that the 
very life of the nation was involved in the life of the 
man we so loved and revered. But as a great artist, 



23 

bringing out some grand figure from the marble, lays by 
one implement and takes up another, with his eye chiefly 
fixed on the work before him, so the Almighty in mold- 
ing for all ages the lofty and pearless form of American 
liberty. No instrument yet wielded by His hand, has 
cut so many a blemish away, and brought to perfection 
so many a feature, as the one now laid aside. But still 
both the Lord and the nation survive, and the work is 
going on. 

How touching also is the lesson of life's uncertainty. 
Many here present were impressively reminded by the 
Pastor of the 1st Congregational Church, on last Fast 
Day, of the virtues of the President. How little did 
either my brother, or we who sat listening, imagine that 
that very day was to rob the nation of such a treasure ! 
On what a thread our happy hopes were hanging ! A 
snap of a pistol, that hardly is noticed at first in the 
room in which it occurs, startles the nation like a thun- 
der peal rolling from ocean to ocean ! Half a million 
of brave men armed can do nothing to guard the life of 
the man they delighted to honor. So death comes in, 
with what calm, stern, resistless step when the time ap- 
pointed has arrived ! 

God is preparing the hearts of our countrymen for 
some rich blessing in time to come. We had lost our 
noble sons and brothers on the field of blood ; and the 
anguish had chiefly smitten those especially related and 
endeared to them. We have now a calamity that star- 
tles all with impartial shock. The Psalmist sings in 



24 

praise of the Great Husbandman, ," Thou waterest the 
earth ; Thou makest it soft with showers ; Thou bles- 
sest the springing thereof." The same Lord has a field 
under culture in the hearts of our countrymen. He is 
making them soft with tearful sorrows. But these melt- 
ing dews prepare us for a spring-time of beauty, a har- 
vest of plenty and joy. And when the time of our 
chastening at length shall have passed, and the new era 
of peace shall have dawned with its splendid promise, 
no national blessing shall be felt to have exceeded the 
life — no national grief to have surpassed in the profit of 
its chastening the death — of the man whom the Ameri- 
can people lament with one heart to-day. 



ADDEESS BY EEV. T. P. FIELD, D. D. 



Fellow Citizens : 

I have been requested by the Mayor and the City 
Council to say a few words to you at this time ; and 
while I diffidently accept their invitation, I dare not 
trust myself to any merely extemporaneous utterances 
on so solemn an occasion. Indeed, no words, my friends, 
can suitably express the feelings of deep grief that are 
within us now, or embody our sentiments of veneration 
and affection for the illustrious dead. The slow tolling 
of the bells — the solemn sound of the minute gun — 
the tender strains of music that fall pathetically upon 
our ears — these badges of mourning that hang in 
heavy folds around our churches and our homes, and 
darken our national flags— these all have a language 
more expressive far than that of any human lips. To- 
day a tide of sorrow such has never been known before, 
has rolled over the Continent from the Atlantic to the 
Pacific coast. To-day aged parents have mourned as for 
a stricken son, and sons and daughters as for a father, 



^- 



26 

and little children have poured forth their tears and 
lamentations, and thousands just out of the house of 
bondage have bowed as if over the bier of their great 
deliverer and friend. 

There has been sorrow before in this nation on the 
death of Presidents and great men. We remember how 
the words " Harrison is dead" smote upon the hearts of 
the people ; how the quick departure of Taylor from the 
high office to which he had been elected stirred the sen- 
sibilities of our countrymen ; how when Webster died 
it was felt that a tower of civic strength on which the 
people leaned had fallen. But in neither of these cases, 
nor in any other in our history, with the exception, it 
may be, of the death of Washington, was there any 
such grief in the hearts of the people as there has been, 
to-day. The time of the President's dq^th, just as he 
was seeing the grand results of his cares and toils — the 
awful manner of his death — the lofty hopes for the fu- 
ture that were centering in him— the increasing confi- 
dence in his wisdom awakened by success — all these 
things have deepened the sorrow of the nation and made 
these funeral solemnities no empty pageantry, but the 
real manifestation of heart-felt grief. 

Friends and fellow citizens, a great man has been slain 
in the high places of the nation. We have said so often 
that he was a good man, that he was an honest man — 
w^e have heard so many of his light and playful sayings 
that appeared like little bubbles on the deep current of 
his thoughts — that we have failed fully to see how great 



27 

a man he was. Future generations will do, I believe, 
more ample justice to his purely intellectual ability and 
power than has ever been done yet. 

See him in youth the child of poverty, born and nur- 
tured in a log cabin at the West, put to hardest toil as 
soon as he had strength to labor, cut off from those 
means of knowledge and intellectual discipline which 
every New England boy possesses, with only about a 
year's education in all his life in any school ; see him as 
soon as he arrives to years of manhood reaching forth 
after knowledge, borrowing the books which he could 
not buy, esteem it the greatest treasure when he had 
made one his own by three day's hard work ; then giving 
himself to the study of the theory and practice of sur- 
veying land ; then turning his attention to the study of 
law, and taking his place speedily among the foremost 
lawyers of his State, and achieving fame as an advocate 
at the bar ; then chosen to the Legislature of his own 
State — then to the Congress of the United States, and 
felt to be a man of sagacity, of clear and decided views of 
political affairs, a man of influence and power ; and could 
any one doubt up to that time, who knew of those be- 
ginnings and that progress, that a rare power of intel- 
lect was pressing him upward. 

Then see him passing through his native State as a 
candidate for the United States Senate, addressing pub- 
lic assemblies with a rival candidate, who was one of 
the most ready, most accomplished, most cogent deba- 
ters that has ever spoken in the Senate chamber. Read 



28 

his speeches there and see if they suffer m the compari- 
son with those of him whom his friends regarded as a 
giant in intellect. 

Then behold the people of these United States, when 
a President was to be chosen, fastening their eyes upon 
Abraham Lincoln, as if by instinct, as the representative 
man in most trying times. See how necessary it was 
that there should be large wisdom, comprehensive knowl- 
edge of affairs, a deep insight into what must be done, 
a steady purpose to do it ; and does not what was ac- 
complished put the consecrating seal of greatness upon 
the mind of him who was so wonderfully successful. 

Let us admit that there are wanting in his intellectual 
efforts, some of the graces of a man of refined and fin- 
ished culture ; so much the more clearly do we see, per- 
haps, the solid strength of the mind itself We see that 
the structure is of granite, though we fail to see the clip- 
pings and adornings of the chisel. There are thoughts, 
there are sentences, there are words in his messages and 
brief speeches and his letters which the world will not 
let die. There is an originality in his way of thinking, 
and a terse vigor of expression that sent home what he 
said to the hearts of the people. The most classical 
orator of America — Edward Everett — spoke at the dedi- 
cation of the cemetery at Gettysburg. The President 
followed in a few words of pathos and of power, which 
will live and be repeated as long, at least, as the great 
oration of the distinguished orator. Hear the conclud- 
ing words of the President spoken there : 



29 

" It is for us to be here dedicated to the great task 
remaining before us ; that from the honored dead we 
take increased devotion to that cause to which they gave 
the last full measure of devotion ; that we here highly 
resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain ; that 
this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of free- 
dom, and that government of the people, by the people, 
and for the people, shall not perish from the earth." 

These were the words of a man who had great force 
of thought, power of eloquence, and whose words will 
arouse the hearts of his countrymen to purer patriotic 
purposes in generation to come. 

When I consider what were the beginnings of the 
life of Abraham Lincoln — how limited his means of in- 
tellectual growth and culture — when I see how steadily 
he advanced upward till he reached the highest pinacle 
of earthly glory — when I see how well and successfully 
he did his work in every successive stage of his advance- 
ment — when I consider what thought, what good judg- 
ment, what mature statesmanship were requisite to guide 
the ship of State through the perilous storms and tem- 
pests of the last four years, I say that the man who has 
been so successful was a great man, and the wise men 
and statesmen of future ages will think him greater than 
we have thought him to be. 

But let men think of this as they may, hardly any 
one questions now, or will question the purity of his 
patriotism. Abraham Lincoln loved his country — his 
whole country. He loved the prairies of the West and 



30 

the hills of New England. He loved the rolling rivers 
and the broad lakes of the land, and the plains warmed 
by a Southern sun. He had no taint of sectionalism. 
Born in a slave State, he had sympathies with the South ; 
dwelling in free States, he knew the value of society de- 
livered from the curse of slavery. He swore, as Presi- 
dent, to preserve, to protect and defend the Constitution, 
and whatever he did as President, he did for that purpose. 
He felt the wrong of slavery, yet he did not pretend it 
was in any spirit of philanthrophy, or with any purpose 
to abolish slavery that he carried on this war. It was 
to protect the Constitution and preserve the national 
life. When he thought that it was necessary, for this 
end, to proclaim emancipation, then, and not till then, 
he sent forth his proclamation. He was slow in com- 
ing to the conclusion of its necessity ; but when he felt 
it to be necessary, he did not waver in his decision, and 
he has never wavered. If that proclamation was with- 
drawn, he always said that some one must do it other 
than himself. He did not like slavery ; but not as an 
anti-slavery man did he utter the decree that slavery 
should cease, but as one bent on saving the whole nation 
under the Constitution. 

He hesitated to employ colored men in the army ; but 
when he came to the conclusion that this, too, was ne- 
cessary for the defence and maintenance of the Constitu- 
tion and the laws, against those who had risen up for 
their destruction, he called in this strong element, and 
hurled the hosts of the oppressed against their oppres- 



31 

sors, because he was determined to preserve the nation's 
life, and to use every lawful weapon of warfare for its 
preservation. Some of us thought Mr. Lincoln was too 
slow ; some of us thought he was too fast in coming to 
his conclusion to proclaim emancipation and to make 
use of colored soldiers in the war. I am inclined to 
think that we shall all come to the opinion, in the end, 
that he was about right ; that amid the conflicting opin- 
ions of our country, and the necessity for public support, 
the best time was chosen for the best results. At all 
events, that he meant to do the best thing for the coun- 
try, we cannot doubt. I do not see, I do not believe 
that he had one thought of self in the measures he 
adopted. I do not believe that the consideration 
whether he would be President again, as a consequence 
of what he did, ever entered his mind. I do not believe 
that the success of his party any farther than he thought 
its success to be identified with the welfare of his coun- 
try, weighed a feather in the scale to determine his de- 
cision. There is nothing, it appears to me, in his words 
or deeds, that would indicate anything like selfishness 
or party spirit, but only a patriotism so pure as to make 
him one of the noblest examples. Fortunate are we 
that we have had such men ; fortunate that at the very 
beginning of our nation's history we had one like Wash- 
ington, whom the world honors, and to whom all the 
lovers of freedom look up ; fortunate that in this new 
era in our country's history, we have had one like Lin- 
coln, whose character the foul breath of aspersion can 



32 

never soil, and in the very thought of which character 
all words of detraction will soon be silenced forever. 

Mr. Lincoln only proclaimed emancipation as a mili- 
tary necessity, for the life of the nation, and to preserve 
and defend the constitution. Yet he must be known in 
the future mainly as the Great Emancipator. The pic- 
ture of Lincoln reading the Emancipation Proclamation 
to his Cabinet will be the chief historical picture of his 
administration. That administration cannot be thought 
of without suggesting the subject of slavery. It was 
this that turned traitorous guns toward Fort Sumter, 
that humbled our flag over our fortification, that raised 
armies against us and starved our men in the dark and 
cruel prison-houses. It was this that had been long the 
chief disturber of our affairs, that was stretching its 
iron hand into the free states, and fettering the press, and 
muzzling the pulpit, and making men tremble at the 
very name of Liberty. The very atmosphere of our 
free country was coming to be almost suffocating in its 
influence through the poison of slavery. But how clear 
is the air to-day— how pure, how bracing now ! What 
a vast change have a few short years wrought! We 
seem almost to stand on a new earth and have a new 
heaven over us. The sunlight of freedom not only gilds 
the hill tops of our land, but has gone down into the 
darkest valleys; and the name of Lincoln will ever 
shine with unexampled lustre as the instrument of this 
most marvellous change. 

My friends, in this last appalling tragedy that robbed 



33 

us of the President, we see a symbol of this conflict 
that has been going on so long. We see in Lincoln the 
representative of freedom. It was mainly because he 
was so that he was hunted by the destroyer. We see 
in the murderous assassin a representative of the slave 
spirit. Not that I can think that the leaders in the re- 
bellion would have counselled so dastardly a deed, but 
it was the slave spirit that awakened the hate and nerved 
the arm for the guilty work. In this we see what the 
spirit of Slavery would gladly have done in our land. 
It would have destroyed freedom if it could, and made 
itself the one controlling power. But in taking the life 
of the good man, the friend of freedom, it, thanks be to 
God, did not destroy freedom itself Is not one of the 
lessons of our holy religion — one of the lessons of the 
cross — this, that though wicked men slay the friend of 
truth and goodness, truth and goodness will not die, but 
live a more vigorous life by virtue of that death 1 We 
shall hear the name of Lincoln mentioned henceforth as 
the martyr of Liberty. It will be sung in the songs of 
freedom, and cause trembling in the palaces of the tyrant 
and oppressor. In the meantime let nothing of the 
malice and hate that was in the heart of the destroyer 
be in ours. We may properly have a keen sense of jus- 
tice — retributive justice to the evil doer. That is a vir- 
tue. That sense of justice needed, it may be, to be deep- 
ened among us. This awful calamity was needed, it may 
be, to eff*ect this object That severe punishment ought 
to fall upon those who have brought such terrible evils 



34 

I upon our land, who can doubt ? But let not the sense 
of" justice degenerate into malice or revenge. Let the 
spirit of the good man who has gone from us be, in its 
essential elements, our spirit still Thankful are we 
that there was forgiveness in his heart for his enemies 
when he died. He may have been too lenient but he 
never could have been weakly indulgent to the violators 
of the laws of his country. Had he lived, necessity, 
and his own love of justice would have made him strong 
to execute the laws in the emergencies of the present 
and the future. The closing words of his last Inaugural 
Address are words as true and good now, as when they 
were delivered at the Capitol, and with these we con- 

,- elude our remarks : 

" With malice towards none, with charity for all, with 
firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, 
let us strive on to finish the work we are in, — to bind 
up the nation's wounds, to care for those who shall have 
borne the battle, — and for their widows and orphans. 
And with all this let us strive for a just and lasting 
peace among ourselves and with all nations." 



b '12 



